Stunning Lamborghini Miura SV restored - with SA heritage

The latest car to be restored by Lamborghini's Polo Storico division is quite a special one. It's red Miura SV, owned by none other than Jean Todt, the current President of the FIA. But that's not the topic of interest for us... This car has a South African history!

This Miura, chassis number #3673, was born on 11 November 1972, using the chassis number of a 1968 Miura S that had been destroyed in an accident. This was apparently not particularly rare in those days as there were several financial motives to do so, the most important one likely being to protect the buyer from high import taxes on new vehicles in certain countries.

It was then delivered in late 1972 to its first owner, a certain Mr. Mecin, in South Africa, painted Rosso Corsa (red), with a lower gold band and interiors in black leather, and this is exactly to the condition that it has been restored now, 47 years later, following the work of the Polo Storico technicians.

The Miura SV's 4.0L V12 engine pumped out around 285kW.

The nuts-and-bolts restoration by Lamborghini's in-house Polo Storico heritage division took 13 months and also involved verification of its conformity with the notes in the assembly books stored in the Lamborghini archives.

Today it is believed that there are only 2 Miuras left in South Africa. It's a car often regarded as the first true supercar and is regularly listed as the most beautiful car of all time. It was penned by the legendary designer Marcello Gandini. SV versions, such as this one, lacked the distinctive "eyelashes" of other Miuras. Around 150 SVs were built.

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With the ultimate goal of spending his life writing about cars, Hannes studied journalism at the University of Stellenbosch. A brief stint as a sports editor for Paarl Post followed, before he joined CAR magazine in 2001. He eventually became the (youngest-ever) editor of CAR in 2011, a position he occupied for two years. During his career at CAR he became a member of the WCOTY (World Car of the Year) panel, wrote a book (Cranked Up: Confessions of a Petrolhead) and was named by the Mail & Guardian as one of the Top 200 South Africans to take to lunch in its 2008 Youth Day supplement, and by The Media magazine as one of the most influential media professionals under 40 (2012). He left CAR in 2013 to experience the "other" side of the industry, working with upcoming brand GWM as Brand and Product Development manager and gaining experience in retail, customer care, dealership networks, product planning, marketing etc. Now, as Cars.co.za 's Customer Experience Manager Hannes is tasked with ensuring visitors to this platform are exposed to the most useful and relevant advice and information possible.